I was in a speech class in college and and I had to write a speech about hurtful name calling and the impact it had on me and Id would like to share what I wrote because it seems people like us are a easy target because of our disablites, illnesses, etc.

If you have known me before this class you would see a different side of me before then now. I have been target of useless hurtful name calling and physical abuse. I don't know why it started but I had to deal with it for a while. The worst years of the bullying was in Middle School (Grades 6-8). But most of the verbal / physical abuse came when I was in 7th grade. The year started out all right although select few boys thought they would be fun to start calling me names like long neck, giraffe, and ugly boy. Then in middle of the year I found out that I had juvenile or type 1 diabetes and that just made matters worse. After 2 weeks being absent from school, I came back to more name-calling but now they were calling me AIDS Girl.

After I came back I had to go to the nurse and take my insulin injection and glucose reading and they would say better go get your " AIDS Medicine and Needle's" before you die. Also they started to attack me in the halls, push me into lockers and try to push me down the flights of stairs. It impacted me a great deal that after getting everything poured on me at once I started to get more and more depressed. I always was crying and telling my parents that I was never going back to that school.

The principal and some teachers thought I was the one to start everything but they never thought to look at the ones really doing the damage.

I rebounded from all the physical/verbal assults in these years, to get on with my life and go to college. I am currently a Junior majoring in Early Childhood Education. When I finnaly graduate I want to be a Child Life Specialist in a Major Childrens Hospital or a Social worker working with newly diagnoised children and Teens.

If anyone has had trouble do tell a trusted adult and they could stop it before it gets worse.

Last Updated: Thursday February 27, 2014 19:28:20
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